Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mademoiselle Valois,
It is with great regret we inform you that your mother, Madame Penelope Valois, has fallen behind on her payment to us.
As she has named you as her cosigner, the matter of the two thousand and seventy-five oyista falls to you.
Enclosed you will find name and address of where payment can be remitted.
If the balance fails to be paid, the house within the confines of Oylen Outer City will be forfeit.
Wishing you a pleasant All Souls,
Monsieur L. Landry
My heartbeat pounded behind my left eye.
The small slip of parchment tucked into the letter bore the address of what I assumed was one of the many gambling dens littering the outer city.
I’d been sending my family almost my entire paycheck as soon as it got to my hands.
Thousands of oyista a month now that Eamon paid for full nights even when he did not call on me—something we’d argued about a number of times.
With the rent now split three ways between myself, Lilith, and Noah, I’d been sure the debts would be paid off easily.
No doubt I’d be receiving another letter from my mother expressing her concern for my brother’s health and the “doctors’ bills” that needed paying.
Lilith wandered into the bedroom, a small silver box in one hand and parchment in the other. Her brows were pinched, lips working as she read. I rubbed my eyes and tucked away the scroll before she could see.
“What is it?”
She passed me the letter. Callum’s handwriting was beautiful, as it was with every note he sent. My cheeks heated at the intimacy and desperation clinging to each word. A small pang rippled through my heart—once Eamon had been this wanting for me, and I had doused any flame he’d held with my fear.
I handed her back the correspondence. “His desperation is…tangible. What did he send you?”
Lilith traced the ink with the tip of one finger, her expression distant while she sat on her bed. When she didn’t respond I sat up and leaned forward. “Lilith?”
She lifted her head, brows ticked up. “Hm?”
I gestured toward the black box in her lap. “What did he send you, love?”
It was hard to believe sometimes that it had only been a year since we’d lost Jules.
In many ways it felt like a lifetime—like Lilith had moved into the apartment centuries ago.
After the pyre had been nothing but embers and I’d returned to the apartment from my walk through the city with Eamon, she’d arrived on our doorstep, sobbing unintelligibly.
Noah had carried her into the house and it had taken us a full hour to get her calm enough to tell us what happened.
The vampire Jules and Solange had sold the townhome to had evicted Lilith.
She’d been given only minutes to gather her belongings before she was shoved through the front door while the downstairs tenants watched from the window.
Noah had held me back from storming over there, reminding me it was daylight and the vampire would have found his rest. Though it had been almost a year since that night, it didn’t stop me from daydreaming about finding the male and setting him aflame.
The only consolation we had was that Eamon swore he was working on a solution—a solution I was almost positive lay in the hands of the male currently courting Lilith.
She opened the box, drew out a small silver phial full of deep red liquid and stoppered with wax. “Merciful fucking goddess…”
My mouth dropped open, another pang hollowing out my chest. “Is that…”
Lilith nodded. “His blood.”
The phial disappeared in her grip, knuckles bleached white with the tension. Her shoulders hiked to her ears while she squeezed her eyes shut as if she could blot out the world. But I could only stare at the place where it was hidden, the offering Callum had made to her.
“I cannot do this,” she rasped.
With a jolt, I jumped forward to shake her shoulders. “What? Why not?”
“Because we don’t know what will happen if I drink his blood, Adrienne! And who knows who this immortal is? Do I want to give him this unlimited access to me? To my body?”
My hands slipped back into my lap. Unlimited access…
If I could do it all again, I would have given Eamon unlimited access to me.
I would have pushed my fears aside and hoped he would guard my heart.
But those first few months after Jules died, we all were shells of ourselves learning how to live in this new life.
Lilith threw herself right into running Risqeu and I felt it was my job to be right there beside her, wiping her tears and picking her up when she crumbled.
And in that time, the fear festered like an infected wound, scarring around my heart until there was nowhere Eamon could reach.
I did not know how to make my way back to him.
Every night I wondered if it would be our last, if the fascination he held for me would finally wane or if he would find another blood mate.
Countless times I’d considered telling him about my family, about my mother and her mates who had abandoned her.
But the shame I carried for my family ran so deep I often never even admitted it to myself.
Lilith’s fingers skated across my arm. “What is it?”
My chest ached with my next breath. “If you drink…you will feel what he feels. His heartbeat. His desire. His longing. And he will feel yours.”
She squeezed my hand. “Oh, Adrienne.”
My lips rolled together and I shook my head. “I have not done it, Lilith…though he has offered many times. Enough that I fear that he will not offer again.”
I could barely get out the last words—I whispered them in fear the goddess might hear and make it truth. My eyes stung and I sniffed while Lilith shifted closer until our knees touched. “You do not know that, Addie.”
But I did know it. I could feel it in my heart, see the pain he tried to hide in every smile, in every gesture. “He will soon grow tired of me, I know it.” The laugh I gave was forced and odd-sounding in my ears. “But that is my woe and not yours. If you drink, you will feel what he feels.”
I squeezed her hands, unable to stomach the pity in her gaze, and rose to the wardrobe we shared so I could dress for the evening. Already I had planned to return home for All Souls to check on my brother, but now it seemed I would be doing more than just visiting with Louis.
“Will he influence my emotions?” Lilith asked.
More than once Eamon had explained to me the temporary bond that would be forged by drinking an immortal’s blood.
The desperate way he’d begged me rushed over my skin like a tide.
In those moments I could have almost believed the mating bond he spoke of was forever, that he truly burned for me, that he wanted me…
Not just what I could give him.
So I hitched a small smile on my face for Lilith. “Not your emotions, no.”
“But other things?”
I would play your body like an instrument, little bird, Eamon had said once, and you would finally feel the need I have for you day and night—the need to fill your cunt so full of my seed no one would wonder who you belonged to.
“Yes, I believe so,” I answered, grabbing one of my traveling corsets and a day dress he’d bought for me.
Lilith was quiet as I dressed and I tried not to let my mind wander to what I would find tomorrow morning at my family’s home.
I’d been careful not to pack anything too expensive, but even the simple dresses Eamon had purchased for me would be finer than was safe.
But Lilith and Noah had forced me to throw away the tattered gowns and I hadn’t been able to stomach telling them why I’d held onto them so tight.
Once I dressed, I padded back to Lilith and presented my back to her so she could do up my laces.
“If Eamon asked to change you, would you let him?”
My hands flexed against my bodice, sweat dewing across my palms. The answer screamed inside my mind again and again: yes, yes, yes. But how horrifying would it be to be damned to an eternal life and forced to live it alone? “I do not think so.”
“Why? If you would drink his blood if he offered it again, does that not mean you are open to the idea?”
I huffed a laugh and dipped my chin. “Immortality seems like a monstrous prospect. Eamon is a rarity amongst his peers.”
My skin was too sizes too small. The air in the room thinned. Sometimes I wondered if there was not an easier option after all. If perhaps everything would be simpler if I ran to Keryes with open arms.
“What would you do, if you were me?” Lilith asked in such a small voice a haze settled over my eyes.
I turned, stroking the back of her head, wishing Jules was here.
“I do not know, because I cannot imagine what it would be like not to know the immortal offering me such a bond. I can only tell you that if Eamon was to ask again…I believe I would drink.” With a sigh I leaned down and kissed her forehead.
“I’m out to run some errands before I leave for All Souls. I’ll meet you at the shop?”
Another moment longer and I would start to scream. I grabbed up my letter from the bed and the pouch of oyista I kept beneath my mattress before heading to the door.
“Love you,” I murmured, though I wasn’t sure if she heard me from where she sat staring at the phial and box on her lap.
The street was quiet as I made my way out. Noah was on patrol nearby and I wandered for a bit toward the river. He came into view, striding through a narrow alley accompanied by one of his fellow Vyenurs, and passed me.
Before I could call out to Noah, they had already stopped and doubled back to me.
“Everything okay?” Noah asked, nostrils flaring.
I nodded. “Yes, I think so. Lilith’s suitor sent her another letter and a gift. I’ve left to give her some privacy.”
He pursed his lips. “What sort of gift?”
“A phial of his blood.”
Noah and the other Vyenur—I was almost sure his name was Rehal—whistled. “Does she know this male?” Rehal asked.
“She doesn’t,” Noah answered for me.
I shifted my weight uncomfortably. “I do. He’s a good male—I trust that no harm will come to her.”
Noah gaped at me while Rehal nodded.
“First, how dare you not tell me you knew,” Noah started, holding up a finger. “And second—”
“I really need to get to the market to pick up some tonic for travel before the morning,” I cut across him. “You know how I get with long carriage rides.”
Noah sighed, rolling his eyes. “Fine. But you aren’t getting away with this. Want us to walk you?”
I shook my head. “No, I need some time alone before tonight.”
My friend bundled me in his arms, pressing a kiss to the crown of my head. “We’ll be around this section of the city if you need anything, all right? Carriage leaves at dawn?”
“Carriage leaves at dawn,” I confirmed.
He pulled back, flicking my nose. “Don’t you dare leave without saying goodbye.”
Sometimes I thought that the kindest thing the goddess had ever done was give me Noah and Lilith.
As I wandered the brightly lit market on the Rachay, picking up a small phial of motion sickness tonic—my one splurge for the month—I couldn’t help but think again about the blood Callum had offered to Lilith.
I wondered if I would live the rest of my life regretting denying Eamon.